Strauss helps or­ches­trate de­served vic­tory over Mun­ster

GLAS­GOW just edged out Mun­ster in an en­ter­tain­ing seven-try PRO12 match on the plas­tic at Rugby Park.

War­riors might have scored more, but, as so-of­ten this sea­son, they made too many un­forced er­rors and failed to com­plete some fine build-up play. Skip­per Josh Strauss rightly won the man of the match award, with some splen­did yard-gain­ing charges; the home backs were gen­er­ally the more-threat­en­ing, but, they found Mun­ster’s de­fence ob­du­rate, while the Welsh ref­eree, al­though he yel­low carded vis­it­ing scrum-half To­mas O’Leary and prop James Cronin, did not en­dear him­self to the home crowd, by turn­ing a blind eye to some Mun­ster of­fences break-down.

Glas­gow wasted lit­tle time in tak­ing the lead – surg­ing down­field, with Leone Nakarawa, Ali Price and Strauss lead­ing the charge. Mun­ster quelled their first three charges at the line, but, in five min­utes, tight-head Sila Puafisi barged over be­tween the posts, Dun­can Weir con­vert­ing for 7-0.

From the restart, Strauss and Taqele Nai­yar­a­voro took play back to the Mun­ster red zone. Strauss was held up on the line but Puafisi was on his cap­tain’s shoul­der to charge over for his se­cond try, again con­verted by Weir.

But, Mun­ster re­cov­ered quickly and two min­utes later they cut the deficit. Wing Rory Scan­nell just failed to gather an an­kle-height pass right in the cor­ner, but a Mun­ster penalty saw them opt for the short-range line-out. Glas­gow held the charge, but the vis­i­tors re­cy­cled right

at the through five phases, be­fore tight-head Dave Kil­coyne bur­rowed over, the ex­tras added by by Ian Keat­ley.

The stand-off fur­ther re­duced the lee­way from a penalty in front of the posts in 20 min­utes, Four min­utes later, the vis­i­tors went in front, and again Kil­coyne was their try scorer. Keat­ley goaled to put Mun­ster ahead 17-14.

The lead changed hands again four min­utes af­ter the restart, as Dun­can Weir scored a su­perb solo try, surg­ing onto Peter Horne’s pass and cut­ting a great line through the de­fence from 30 me­tres out for an un­con­verted try.

Vis­it­ing nine O’Leary was then yel­lowed and Glas­gow stretched their lead through a Weir penalty. How­ever, the Ir­ish­men again hit back and when a close-range maul was held, re­place­ment hooker Mike Sherry broke clear to touch down in the cor­ner.

Keat­ley con­verted to put Mun­ster 24-22 ahead, but, as the match en­tered its fi­nal 10 min­utes, Glas­gow claimed the bonus-point try, when, from a ruck un­der the posts, they switched play left and Strauss sent Glenn Bryce over for an un­con­verted try to clinch the five­point win for War­riors, with Mun­ster hav­ing to set­tle for a los­ing bonus.